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JANUARY 27,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:40 P.M. ET: 

THIS WOMAN IS INCOHERENT – FROM FOX:   President Biden climate advisor Gina McCarthy said Wednesday that the administration is "not asking for sacrifice" with its executive order to shut down construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.  According to the Keystone XL website, the project, initially proposed more than a decade ago, would have sustained about 11,000 U.S. jobs in 2021 – including 8,000 union jobs – and generated $1.6 billion in gross wages.  "The most exciting thing about this is we're not asking for sacrifice here," McCarthy said during a Wednesday interview on NBC's "TODAY Show." "The president fully understands that people are suffering now. So this all about recovering from the COVID crisis. This all about building good, clean jobs, jobs where you can get access to jobs to good pay and unions."  She continued: "This is all about investing in the infrastructure we need to build that future that is going to get us to clean electricity and net-zero in 2050. This is about promises he made that he's gonna keep."  Do you have any idea what she's talking about?  I don't.  She comes directly from the administration of Saint Barack of Chicago, so she may speak a different language.  Someone please tell her that thousands of workers are being laid off right now as a result of newly announced Biden policies.  She didn't mention one job available to them in the real world.

SUCH BRILLIANCE, SUCH A SENSE OF PRIORITIES – FROM DAILY MAIL:   San Francisco's school board has voted to rename schools honoring George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln.   The former presidents are among the historical figures set to be struck off as namesakes of the area's public schools,  Others on the list include Francis Scott Key, who wrote the words to the national anthem; former presidents William McKinley, James Garfield, James Monroe and Herbert Hoover;  Revolutionary War hero Paul Revere; and author Robert Louis Stevenson.  Even current senator Dianne Feinstein does not escape, due to allegations she replaced a damaged Confederate flag outside City Hall when she was mayor in 1986.  The controversial move follows a 6-1 vote among school board members on Tuesday to rename 44 schools in light of a wave of anti-racism protests that swept the country last summer.   I'd like to know the new names that will go on the schools.  I hear that one honoree was notified today, and said that it's the best day he ever spent on Death Row.

January 27, 2021       Permalink

AHEM, AHEM, HOW DO WE GET OUT OF THIS?  THUS SAY THE US SENATORS, WHO ARE MAKING FOOLS OF THEMSELVES – AT 5:45 P.M.:  Now there is a proposal to forget the impeachment trial, where an acquittal is almost certain, and replace it with a censure resolution.  A censure resolution isn't worth the paper it's printed on, but it makes people feel good and righteous.  From Fox: 

With only five Republicans joining all 50 Democrats in the Senate on Tuesday in rejecting a push by GOP Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky to declare the trial unconstitutional, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Trump’s second impeachment trial will likely end in acquittal.

And that’s spurring two moderate senators – Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia and Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, who was one of the five GOP lawmakers to say the trial’s constitutional – to pitch to their colleagues in the chamber an option to censure Trump.

"I think it's pretty obvious from the vote today that it is extraordinarily unlikely that the president will be convicted. Just do the math," Collins said on Tuesday evening.

Kaine told reporters on Wednesday that censure could be an alternative to holding a trial that would divert precious Senate time from confirming President Biden’s Cabinet nominees and passing coronavirus pandemic vaccination funding and relief aid.

"I have been talking with a number of my colleagues, a handful, for a couple of weeks about the likelihood that we would fall short on impeachment. And by doing that, not only will we fall short but we would use time for something that we could be using for COVID relief, which I think is just so dire right now," Kaine said.

"To do a trial knowing you'll get 55 votes at the max seems to me to be not the right prioritization of our time," Kaine added. "Obviously we do a trial, maybe we can do it fast but my top priority is COVID relief and getting the Biden cabinet approved."

COMMENT:  But Democratic Leader Schumer insists there will be a trial.  He has got to please the kamikaze wing of the Democratic Party, which dreams of a revolution featuring guillotines.

The trial is ridiculous, and likely unconstitutional.  Added to Biden's first week in office, with its leftist executive orders, we are truly living in a brave new world.

January 27, 2021       Permalink

JANUARY 26,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

A BIT OF EMBARRASSMENT – FROM AMERICAN THINKER:   An opinion writer who frequently contributed op-eds to the New York Times has admitted to being paid well by the Iranian mission to the United Nations but insists that this did not make him an agent of the Iranian government or influence his writing. Kaveh Afrasiabi is currently under arrest, accused of violating the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA). For its part, the New York Times, which still claims to publish “all the news that’s fit to print,” is dummying up, keeping its readers in the dark on the subject, and offering no comment.  The current Times management probably doesn't see any problem at all.  Maybe he was doing some babysitting for Iranian diplomats.  Children must be cared for.

ONCE A RADICAL, ALWAYS A RADICAL – FROM WESTERN JOURNAL:   Former Attorney General Eric Holder urged Democrats to “use the power” of their new majority to pack the Supreme Court.  In a virtual conference on judicial reform hosted by the Brookings Institution on Monday, Holder said Democrats need to act now that they have control of the White House and Congress.  “It is painfully clear, at least to me, that Democrats and progressives are, and have been, uncomfortable with the acquisition and the use of power … Republicans and conservatives never have been,” Holder said.  Holder outlined how Republicans allegedly “abused their power” by rushing through the nomination of Justice Amy Coney Barrett to keep control of the Supreme Court.  “[Republicans] abuse their power to give themselves unfair advantage,” he said. The guy has always been on the wingnut left, and ran the most politicized Justice Department in memory.

January 26, 2021       Permalink

SOLID REPORTING – BY SALENA ZITO, ON THE INCREASING CONSERVATISM OF AMERICAN HISPANICS – AT 10:32 P.M. ET:   It is a bright spot in the Republican Party's future.  Hispanics, once considered "in the pocket" of the Democrats, are moving rightward.  From the New York Post:  

Forty-seven years ago, Maria del Carmen Guzman-Weese stood with her mother and sister to take the oath of US citizenship. Then 17, Maria suddenly turned to her mother, and said: “I love this country but I cannot be a citizen because of you. I need to want it because of me.”

Three years later, Maria finally took that oath, because it was her choice, and so she could vote for Ronald Reagan. “That time it came from my heart,” she said.

Many Hispanic immigrants like Maria feel a natural affinity for the Republican party — an allegiance that often bewilders Democrats.

Ever since Barack Obama won 71 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2012, Democrats have assumed this group was a monolithic voting bloc that would gravitate toward the party’s ideals, mainly because they are “a minority.”

More Hispanics voted Republican in the 2020 presidential election than in 2016, and this trend is expected to continue.

But in fact, the 32 million Hispanics living in the United States come from a variety of different countries, experiences and cultures. Factors like faith, income and country of origin frame their disparate views, and increasingly more of them are voting conservative.

While Joe Biden won 66 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2020, Donald Trump actually increased his support with the bloc by 4 percent, earning 32 percent overall.

COMMENT:  Read the rest.  The key here is that Hispanics are drawn to the Republican Party by its principles.  If the GOP starts diluting those principles, the attraction will disappear.

January 26, 2021       Permalink

WHAT A COLOSSAL DISGRACE, BUT IT SOON WILL BE OVER – AT 5:31 P.M. ET:  The mighty United States Senate has voted to proceed with the Trump impeachment circus.  But the vote spells doom for those hoping for a conviction.  From CNN: 

Washington (CNN)The Senate tabled an effort by Sen. Rand Paul Tuesday to force a vote on the constitutionality of former President Donald Trump's impeachment trial, but the vote offered an indicator for how Republican senators -- who overwhelmingly voted for Paul's measure -- feel about the trial.

Paul's motion was killed on a 55-45 vote, with five Republicans joining all Democrats, meaning 45 Republicans voted for Paul's effort. Republican Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania crossed party lines to vote with Democrats.

In order to convict Trump at his trial, at least 17 Republicans will need to vote with all Democrats when the trial begins next month. Significantly, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell sided with Paul in the vote -- a potential indicator that he agrees the constitutionality of impeaching a former President is in question.

Paul argued after the vote that the fact that 45 Republicans sided with him "shows that impeachment is dead on arrival."

"If you voted that it was unconstitutional then how in the world would you ever hope to convict somebody for this?" Paul asked, adding ,"45 of us, almost the entire caucus, 95% of the caucus, voted that the whole proceeding was unconstitutional. This is a big victory for us. Democrats can beat this partisan horse as long as they want -- this vote indicates it's over, the trial is all over."

Even those Republicans who voted against Paul's measure -- including Collins -- said Tuesday's vote was a sign of the eventual outcome of the trial.

COMMENT:  Of course it's unconstitutional.  The Senate has no power to try a private citizen, even a former president.  And the Constitution specifically states that an impeachment trial of a president must be presided over by the Chief Justice of the United States.  In this case, Chief Justice Roberts has declined to participate.

President Biden could have been a hero here, and reinforced his clearly phony call for unity, by asking Democrats in the Senate to drop this crazy trial.  He did not, and it will be noted.

January 26,  2021     Permalink